PHILADELPHIA -- The 76ers say they don't care if people look at their schedule and think they've devoured more cupcakes than a stressed-out college kid on a TastyKake binge during finals.

They might not care, but they know.

They knew it Monday night when they started a string of seven straight games against winning teams by hosting the Orlando Magic. And while they spent the first 45 minutes of the game putting forth an effort sharp enough to give them a 74-69 victory, the final three minutes seemed to speak to the concerns this team inevitably must put to rest.

After spending most of the night ferociously challenging Magic center Dwight Howard and building their halftime lead to 18 points with 2:54 remaining, the Sixers went into whatever one would call the NBA's version of football's prevent defense.

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The awkward attempt to burn clock and allow Orlando to take 2-point buckets, combined with five missed free throws -- including one air ball by Andre Iguodala, whose foul shooting has inexplicably regressed in recent seasons -- somehow got the Magic within threatening distance. The Sixers' lead was down to seven when Glenn Davis' 3-point attempt with 10 seconds left allowed them to finally exhale.

"It's just concentration," said Doug Collins, trying to stay grounded when his team's late-game Jekyll-and-Hyde stunt had him on the verge of a personality shift. "They start looking at the score and think the game's over. It's human nature ... You have to maintain your level of concentration.

"Do you see how fast things go? I thought (Orlando coach) Stan Van Gundy had eight timeouts there at the end of the game. I was like, 'How many more timeouts does he got?'

"Don't get me wrong. I'm thrilled we won the game. But this is when you have to do your teaching."

The Sixers (15-6) caught the Magic (12-9) banged up and in a tailspin, losers of five of their last six. Chicago, Miami, Atlanta, San Antonio and Los Angeles' two teams aren't having those issues, so the Sixers can consider the end of their 11th home win in 13 games a warning.

"We're happy for the win," Elton Brand said, "but at the end of the day, playing like that is going to cost us in the future against really good teams -- missing free throws, not executing on defense, letting guys get wide-open 3s.

"We're not going to be up 19 all the time."

It put a little damper on what otherwise was an amazing defensive performance, particularly when you consider the third- and fourth-string centers were tasked with defending Howard.

Veteran Tony Battie, who served as a mentor to Howard during his years with the Magic, had eight points and nine rebounds in 17 minutes battling the All-Star.

Although Collins dressed first-round pick Nik Vucevic for the game after he watched the previous four in street clothes, the 76ers coach turned to his other rookie center, Lavoy Allen, to play in the second quarter when Howard took a break on the bench.

When Howard came back into the game midway through the quarter, Allen stayed on the floor and was doing an amazingly good job of jousting with the most physically imposing center in the game.

"Big Baby (Glenn Davis) tried to back him down twice and he looked like he hit a wall," Collins said. "Lavoy did a great job.

"I thought when we went to the bench we picked it up (defensively), and we were swarming the rest of the game."

That performance earned Allen another go at Howard once Battie started to run low on fuel in the third quarter, and Allen helped the Sixers close the third by outscoring Orlando 21-9 in the period to take a 58-42 lead into the fourth.

Collins believed that the Magic being without Chester High and Saint Joseph's University product Jameer Nelson at point guard because of a concussion suffered over the weekend made the defensive task far easier.

"I think Jameer Nelson is the guts of that team," Collins said. "For him not to play in Philadelphia tonight must have been very painful for him.

"Just watching them play, I know how important Jameer Nelson is to that team."

If this had been any of the cupcakes the Sixers had dismantled in most of their first 10 home wins, turning that 16-point lead into a rout would have been unsurprising. However, even though Orlando was without Nelson and had been blown out three times while losing four of their previous five games, it wasn't going to go that easily.

And Collins realizes that the regular-season record might look good, but in order to become a postseason force the Sixers have to clean up their end-game flow.

"If we're going to be a team that's going to be a legit team in the playoffs," Collins said, "then we can't let teams score 18 points in the last three minutes and not get one stop. So I let them know."